Page 46 of Pack Baby for the Silver Foxes

I looked.

Unknown number: Please. We need to talk.

We didn’t. We needed several lawyers, a therapist, and I was still contemplating bathing in holy water.

I turned the phone face down.

The nausea eased by one degree, then surged again when the room door opened and Damien walked in.

He stood at the door of the lecture hall wearing a navy university hoodie, sandy hair damp from the cold, hockey bag slung over one shoulder. He looked unfairly good.

His eyes found me.

My body braced, not with longing. That was the part I kept checking for, as if heartbreak might have been delayed. But every time I saw him, all I felt was tired. Tired and faintly embarrassed that I’d once mistaken his attention for love.

Damien moved down the aisle.

I closed my notebook.

The girl in front of me glanced over her shoulder, sensing drama, and immediately began pretending not to listen while planning to report everything to at least three friends.

Damien stopped beside my row. “Marli.”

The name irritated me now too. That was inconvenient, given that I’d built an entire life around it.

“I’m in class,” I said.

“You haven’t answered me.”

“Astute.”

“Can we talk?”

“No.”

The professor paused at the front, marker in hand. He looked at Damien, then at me, then made the very wise decision that he didn’t want to be involved in whatever this was and returned to the slide.

Damien lowered his voice. “We need to talk.”

My stomach twisted.

Two days with his dads. Hotel sheets. Violet. Lincoln’s hands holding me through the pain. Hudson’s phone ringing with Damien’s name on it. Their clothes in a nest I’d denied building.

Oh my God.

I gripped the edge of my notebook.

“We’ve talked, and...” I said.

“Where did you go for two days? I called every clinic and the only one that had your name, said you never turned up.”

“How many cheerleaders have you fucked behind my back?” I whisper-hissed.

He glared at me. “You left without telling anyone. Anything could have happened to you.”

“I wasn’t aware you were entitled to my location under the terms of our imaginary non-relationship. What is it again… oh yes, non-exclusive.”

His jaw tightened. “Don’t do that.”